I just spend 1 hour helping someone buy and download Norton Antivirus 2004 from the Symantec website. After 1 hour, he still wasn't able to correctly click the download link and get the software saved on his computer. I mean, come on... it's not that hard, is it?

I've let him check various download locations, but apparently every time he selected a location, "the window disappeared" and nothing was saved. I'm going over there in about an hour to see what the problem. I can't waste any more time on the telephone with this guy, it's time to go over there and charge him for my time. Damn, end users are sometimes such a pain in the friggin' ass!

I got a call about an hour ago, and as presumed, it was bad news. I've not made it past the selection, but they were able to give me some tips in regard to what courses might be better for me. Well, of course I wondered what the reaon was and they said that I didn't fit the profile of the group because they feared my theorethical knowledge was presumably at a lower level as the rest of the group.

Well, I probably agree with them, since I'm more of a hands-on-experience person myself, and I really dislike theorethics. So, it's back to the drawing board for me. I'm gonna check out those two other courses she mentioned, but one was in Hasselt and the other one in Geel or something like that. Both are a bit too far to reach by bicycle... but I know that these things are often repeated, so I'll see if I can join a course in Antwerp instead. Gotta call Jan, as he's doing one right now.

I added a Fuzzies album to the photogallery. I was planning on doing that anyway, and since Jay asked specifically about photographs of the ferrets, I went ahead and did it. It's far from complete, but I can't find a bunch of pictures right now, and I got tons more on the old drives. I think I should really look into recovering that data. I'm sure there's some shots of Fritz on that drive, and maybe even some of Igor as well. I doubt I've got any pictures of Jason (yeah, I had a ferret called Jason, no kidding) since I only had him for a few months and it was pre-digital camera age.

Fuck. I just realized that I completely missed today's episode of "24". I've seen all the previous episodes, so missing this one was utterly dumb, I admit. A quick mail to see if anyone had recorded it might have been successful, as according to Nadia, my partner in computer crime Dimi, has all episodes on DVD. Let's hope it's indeed correct so I can catch up.

Apart from that, nothing much is new. Tomorrow I'll get my (bad) result concerning the motivation interview I did 2 weeks ago, and within a few seconds I'm gonna go entertain the fuzzies and have something to eat. Those two actions are not related to eachother.

Hopefully the weather will be a bit better tomorrow, as Max was already looking forward to playing outside (on the terrace/balcony) like they did on friday, but it's been raining and pretty windy all day. Please give us at least one more good day (not too hot, not too cold and no rain please) so the fuzzies can play outside again. They'll be very grateful!

Today I received a video message from my godson... the little kiddo is well on his way to become a comic talent! In about 2.5 months he'll be 2 years old, and he's saying his first words : especially "ja" (yes) seems to be a favorite. Earlier on it was "Bea". I think he wanted to tell his mommy and daddy he wants to have a little sister.

Well, I suggest you watch the video message for yourself, although it probably won't make much sense unless you understand Dutch. It's 3 minutes and 41 seconds long and about 12MB large, so only users with a broadband (DSL or cable) connection should attempt to download it.

Some of the topics in the interview include : Will ServMe find a lover (according to Alex, I'll have three), what my new job will be like, and the length of my sister (his godmother) and the size of her breasts. I suspect the fact that daddy is interviewing Alex has got something to do with the weird questions ;)

What can I say? I certainly agree with the fact that the summer has been hot... too hot for me even, and I understand Hillary's rage about her biography being censored in China. Apparently, the local publisher has left out (amongst others) negative comments of the former first lady about China and human rights.

People looking for the "Any Key" might also need some help finding the "G-spot" I guess. Maybe a study to find out if there is any correlation between computer illiteracy and not being able to sexually satisfy your partner is in order? I damn well know for certain that I can find "Any Key" on a keyboard, and I've never had complaints about not being able to push the right buttons when having sex either. We all know that Geeks are Sexy, right?

The fact that dogs are genetically closer to us as mice are sounds quite reasonable to me. I mean, we always say that "dogs are a man's best friend", but I've never heard anyone say "mice are a man's best friend". Says enough!

Yes, yes... yes I am. Why? Because I finally was able to get in touch with a long lost friend who moved to the UK. Well, she wasn't really lost, but I did lose her e-mail address a long time ago - thanks to a PC crash and a lot of laziness in recovering data - and have since that day been trying all possible first and last name combinations. I must have bugged almost all of the companies Domino servers with incorrect addresses and I got undelivered messages plentiful.

But, yesterday I did it. I did some looking around on the page and noticed a similarity in the way their e-mail addresses are constructed. Two bounces later I knew one of the messages went through, and indeed it did! This morning I got a reply from Pascale, who seems to have found a new hobby : stair jumping. Well, she's always been a bit of a fruitcake, so I'm not really suprised. And she's getting married next year.

Nadia, here's the non-techy (well, as much as possible) explenation of the domain wildcarding trick Verisign installed.

Example domain : friedkitten.com

If you enter friedkitten.com in your browser, you are directed right to this website. If you enter "friedkiten.com" (or any other non-existing domain in the .com and .net TLD) you are directed to Site Finder (sitefinder.verisign.com) instead of getting an error message that the domain was not found.

While Verisign considers this a way of "helping lost surfers" the obvious reason is cash. If you can (re)direct millions of surfers to a site that you own, imagine what advertising wealth that site could generate - and don't forget the data-gathering capabilities of it!

So far, so good... sort of. Because of the wildcarding of .com and .net, every possible name you enter in your browser, will now resolve - even if it directs you to site finder. A technical measure that was installed to combat spam and still is in use by lots of mailservers, is to verify the domain before accepting mail. Which means that a spammer could not send mail from domain "iuy99-ziorzdfe.com", unless that domain actually existed.

If the mailserver checked the domain and it didn't resolve, mail was not accepted. However, thanks to Site Finder, every domain resolves, so spammers can now use the fakest domains they want to (apparently) send spam from, as the mailserver will verify the existence, get a result back (domain ok) and accept the spam. Apart from that fact, the "domain does not exist" error message delivered to the mailserver is much smaller as the load that Site Finder creates, thus the mailservers need extra bandwidth for the increased datastream.

Still a "too far from my bed" show? You're the proud owner of a mobile phone, and it allows you to access the internet. It doesn't care how long you are connected to the net, as you are billed for the amount of data you transmit or receive. You enter friedkitten.com and reach this site (which reminds me that I should look into creating a wap/i-mode version of it). If you enter a non-existing URL, you get 4.7KB stuffed down your connection, something you didn't ask for, but will be paying for.

Firetrust released Mailwasher Pro 3.20 today, go check it out if you don't use it yet, or upgrade if you got MWP 3.1 running.

Qualcomm launched Eudora 6.0 on September 4th and offers some new functionality compared to 5.21. Both of the e-mail tools mentioned support IMAP and SSL connections... if only my ISP would offer those as well!

Opera 7.20 also saw the light today and is according to early adapters improved and faster as it's 7.11 predecessor. If you're looking for an alternative to the dreaded IE, make sure you give Opera a chance. Or you could try the stable Mozilla 1.4.1 browser, and if you're willing to test beta software, Mozilla 1.5 RC-1.

In other news : ICANN slapped Verisign on the wrist too days ago for wildcarding all (non-existent) .com and .net domains and thus redirecting millions of surfers to their SiteFinder site. So far Verisign plays it hard and stands by their decision, claiming it is "a powerful tool that improves Web navigation for users." in their press release. Since that press release also contained a feedback address, I did send them a mail last night, wich promptly resulted in an automated answer. You can find both below.

Dear,

Wildcarding millions of .com and .net domain names in the hope a typo will generate revenue for your own benefit - and in the mean time breaking all kinds of mechanisms used to battle the ever increasing spam problem on the web - sounds like a clear breach of moral and ethical standards, not to mention legal standards.

I would be highly in favor of verisign suspending the wildcarding immediately and end the hijacking of millions of internet users daily. Of course unless the idea behind the wildcarding is to increase the registration of domain names and all their variations, of course through Verisign. Well, rest assured that I will not be registering any domain name in the future through a company that goes postal on the internet.

Wait, ain't Verisign an american company? Ah, that explains it I suppose. If the president can decide to go to war with whomever and whenever he likes, pushing the UN aside as he sees fit, I suppose the "American Dream" allows US companies to do the same. Just keep into consideration that Bush is begging the UN right now to intervene and support him, as his popularity has dropped to the lowest ever and he can't get the public to believe the lies anymore.

Solo missions like this, they always bite you in the ass... when you least expect it.

Kind regards,

ServMe.

Their reply :

Dear Customer,(I'm not a customer of yours, not will I ever be)
Thank you for contacting VeriSign Customer Service.

Thank you for contacting Customer Service. (Great line, but it looks suspiciously like the one before? Wait, maybe there's a difference between Verisign Customer Support and Customer Support?) We understand you have experienced a technical issue related to the introduction of our Site Finder service. For immediate assistance, please refer to the Technical FAQs we have posted on our site at: (I have not experienced a technical issue with SiteFinder, I want that thing off the web!)
http://www.verisign.com/nds/naming/sitefinder/

If you continue to experience problems, please email us at [email protected](Please people... don't hold back! Tell them what fools they are) and our technical support will address your issue promptly.

We remain committed to ensuring that Site Finder improves Web navigation and the user experience.

Thank you.

If you require further assistance please contact us by replying to this email.

I wonder if there is a male-to-female version of "How to be a superflirt" as well? I've just read the tips, so now I should be well aware of the tactics used by females to flirt. I might now have a chance of picking up on the signals, should they ever occur.

I bet it's never gonna happen, or at least not anytime soon. I a Geek (note the capital G) and I while I know lots about bits, bytes and connections... I seem to be completely lost when it comes to butts, bites and social interaction.

I've always known that some systems were not secure, and could easily be hacked into. However, today I saw with my own eyes that some systems are wide open - or the intended security systems fail completely. I was also shown that it doesn't even take brains, just a bit of logical thinking and luck.

Forget all the ethical jumbo jumbo and whether or not using "warez" is theft, we're purely focussing on the security side of this issue. Let's presume we're looking for a program which is used all over the world, and available in a multitude of languages. Small and large corporations, financial institutions, universities and clinics often use it. Of course, they need a way to distribute the software to their (intranet) users.

For this purpose they often set up centralized download systems, FTP servers and such. Everyone would expect that the least that would be done is a username or IP address check before accessing those sections, right? Well, quite often, none of that is happening. I've seen free access to FTP servers containing patches, updates and full downloads of all kinds of software, both open source, freeware, as well as commercial high end packages. I've witnessed downloads from intranet sites and "secure" locations, all because the administrators fucked up, or didn't install any security check at all.

Please people... If you need a way to distribute software to a large userbase, don't do it through publicly accessible systems or sites. Use the intranet for those things, and if in doubt whether or not the intended solution is safe, don't implement it unless you know it is secure.

Ever had a headache? Who doesn't. Ever popped a pill to cure the headache? Who doesn't. Ever thought about that little pill that makes you feel better? That's what I thought.

I suggest you read this article called "Confessions of a ten-a-day man" and then think about your pill popping habits again. Sure, it's a long read, and it might result in a mental or even life-style hangover, but... don't they have pills to take care of that?

Especially in the "how dumb can you get" category. As I said before, I plan on doing some cleaning and maintenance today, but I first had to drop off a pair of car keys I found in saturday. Since no one had asked about them so far, I cycled over to the cops so they could handle it. They dropped them in the big "lost items" box :)

With that out of the way, I stopped over at the supermarket to pick up a scrubbing broom because I need one if I want to scrub the terrace, right? Well, I get one and head back home. The first thing I run in to when I open my supplies cabinet is... a scrubbing broom! Go me... now I'm stuck with two of those things I hardly ever use. I don't use them when cleaning the tiles inside the appartment coz I've got some other handy thingy for that. I can't use it outside though, coz it would be a bit too rough on it. Hence the reason I needed a scrubbing broom.

I stopped over at the bank to pick up some account details, but the three IAM/BME Bowling meet payments I'm expecting haven't arrived yet. Even though those people told me they'd pay early last week. Well, they're in luck because even with 3 people dropping out, I can't drop the second lane. If they show, they'll be able to bowl - if they pay of course. I'm gonna go over the the bowling alley this week and make reservations for two lanes. Only 20 days till the meet!

Yeah, I'm up early. I got called by an acquaintance complaining about her cable ISP not getting her computer a correct IP address - at 08h20 in the morning! I hardly call that an emergency of any kind, especially since I can't fix it, and certainly not over the damn phone. Oh well... I'm up.

Last night as I tried falling asleep I convinced myself to do some maintenance around the place - things I've been pushing in front of me for quite a while. So, today I'll clean the terrace... I think :)

[Today's title is the song that was playing when I started writing this entry. Nothing more, nothing less. How exciting!]

I've been neglecting the blog a bit the past few days, haven't I? Well, let's see what I did to cause that neglection... I slept a lot (seriously fucked up sleeping schedule, once more), been playing around with a new usenet client (BNR2) because I had some problems with the usenet servers of my ISP.

I know that switching client because the server fucks up sounds weird, but there is a good readon for it. BNR2 supports multiple servers, so I set out on a "free usenet server" search frenzy and am now getting whatever I need from anywhere of the 21 or so additional servers I've added. Most of them are slow and often unreachable, but it's better as being stuck with 98% completion on certain files.

I should also add that BNR2 takes a while to understand, and even though I've managed the get it all working without opening any manual so far, I think I might do it later on. It's a powerful program, but you can hardly call it userfriendly :)

On friday I went out to play tablesoccer, and our team lost 13-5, although we did what we could. It's a bad way to start the season, but our team is stronger overall so we should be able to do better in the next months. And I'm sure we will :)

Joco & Steph! They both correctly "guessed" that Hannelore Z�lhke is my favorite kind of girl.

She's witty, spontaneous, cute and has that wild attitude. And actually, I think she's got the perfect mentor for her MBB course : Deborah Ostrega, known as one of the Mediamadammen, but - at least more known to me - also from Lords of Acid. Deborah and Hannelore both seem to have that in-your-face attitude. That "If you don't like it, too bad" or "straight to the point" way of being. Sexy!

I think Joco got it right because he knows me pretty well (Esther would have gotten is right as well I think, and so would have Eef), and Steph well, I don't know. Maybe she just likes the same kind of girls I do?

Hilda, Dimi, Tine, Nadia and Jay : aaarrrgghhhh! You suck! ;)

Thanks for playing everyone, and keep your eyes open for new "play along" posts in this blog!

When I opened my mailbox this morning I spotted a mail from Microsoft - or at least that's what it appeared to be. A quick glance around told me that I had gotten that mail 4 times, which immediately raised all virus/spam triggers that I possess. I must admit that the author has done a wonderful job and the mail was rather believable, but there are a few things everyone should keep in mind :

1. Microsoft NEVER sends out patches by mail. Only announcements are done by mail.
2. Getting the same mail a couple of times means trouble in 99.5% of the cases.
3. Typo's and errors usually give spam/virus mails away (although this one didn't)

And people... it uses a vulnerability in IE (MS01-020) that was patched in March 29, 2001 and updated on June 23, 2003. So keep those boxes up to date on those patches, and those virusscanners checking for new updates regulary. And above all : think before you click!

OK peeps... take a look at Miss Belgian Beauty 2004 and tell me who you think I find the most attracting lady of those 20 finalists?

Answer in comment please, if possible number and name of the candidate, and if you're up to it : why you think I'm attracted to her. I know at least 2 people who will be able to pick my winner out without secondguessing, but one of them reads this blog very rarely and the other one doesn't at all (I think).

In case you wonder, I moved the MBB post to the top, as I'd like to get some more guesses. Now to the current events :

I decided to take public transportation to the interview, to see if I could find a way to shave off some time. With careful planning it should be possible, but I've got a sneaking fear that it won't be necessary. For a couple of reasons I think I fucked up the interview rather bigtime, and on the 29th I'm gonna get a call that I'm not selected for the course. Why?

First thing they asked (4 people were present) - and kept on asking - was why I started off in school studying a particular course, only to switch later on. I explained my reasons to do so, but they just kept on grilling me about it. I mea, come on... it's 10 years ago! Doesn't what I did later on count anymore?

Then they went on wondering why I'd like to follow the course and I explained it would be great to get back up to date etc. They didn't seem to impressed with it, especially not when I explained that so far I had limited my job hunt to my immediate area due to transport problems. Oh well, if I don't make it, so be it I guess. There's more things I can do, and not all may be lost... I'll know for sure on the 29th.

When I came back I hopped on a bus, then onto a tram in the center of Antwerp and suddenly everything came to a grinding halt. No more power = no more trams. We had to get out as it apparently a large crane had ripped the powercords of Tram 12, which took out the entire line. I walked from the center of Antwerp (where I actually came across the spot where the crane hit the powercords) to the edge of Deurne when I noticed busses carrying a "Pendel" sign. Unfortunately, the first one that passed me did so while I was inbetween stops so I had to let that one go.

At the next stop I waited for 35 minutes before the next "Pendel" bus arrived and I got on. It was fucking crowded of course, but hey... I got home. It only took me about 2 and a half hour to get home this time. Not bad for a total point-to-point distance of 14 kilometers, is it?

Oh, I also only scored a 19 out of 30 on that technical test. I was disappointed by it to be honest. Sure, when you let yourself be tricked by questions like "what is www.friedkitten.com?" and the possible answers are 1. a hostname 2. a MAC address 3. a domain name or 4. an IPv6 address, I only have to blame myself :(

Tine, thanks for your guess, and Steph as well! I've added your votes to the current ranking. Any more candidats who want to guess?

It's this late already? Better head off to the kitchen and have some food - well, prepare some food I mean. I really dunno what I'm gonna do when I get back into a "eat three times a day, it's healthy" rythm.

Let's see... I had my first meal around 16h00, and it consisted in 8 leaves of bread with something on it. And now I'm gonna have my second meal... I'm good :)

I was just listening to Pink's 2001 album called Missundaztood and I gotta say that I was pleasantly suprised by it. Everybody probably knows her hit singles "Get this party started", "Just like a Pill" or "Don't let me get me", but this album is much more than that!

It also contains some very nice - almost soul-like - tracks like "My Vietnam" and "Eventually". "Gone to California" is another one of those slow tracks that just blows you away, and if you wanna get back into the groove you'll turn probably turn to "18 Wheeler" or "Respect".

Apparently some people had a bit of a problem understanding the "lyrics" of the K4 song "Ik ben een klein geil sletje", so even though it was past 01h30 I did my job and transcribed the lyrics. I also updated the contents on the FTP server with a zipfile that includes the lyrics.

A few days ago I got an MP3 file by mail, and I've been playing it a few times since it's damn funny. However for people that don't understand Dutch, nor know K3, it's nothing special. Here's the title and artist :

Seems I missed the release of Eudora 6 earlier this month! I think I'll better go take a look to see what's new.

Version 1.4 of Gallery was released according to the announcement I just received, so that's another piece of nifty software I gotta take a look at.

Fort� Inc. has still not released their 2.0 version of Agent/Free Agent and but I would have loved to test that one too. Especially since I was a bit too trigger happy with the delete button a few days ago and SOMEHOW killed half of the program files as well as 95% of saved data. Maybe I should have thought twice before confirming the delete, alas I didn't. It was only seconds later that I noticed there were so few icons and files in the Agent directory that I slapped my self on the forehead. Damn! Oh well, I reinstalled and am now busy tracking down interesting newsgroups. If you know any, please tell me about it!

Hehe, that was good! OK, "Enough" is about J Lo being a cop. That's all I remember, but imdb says this about it : (reads imdb review) wait, I didn't mean "Enough", I actually ain't seen "Enough". Damn my brain, or the lack of it.

I was referring to "Angel Eyes". So, let me try again. Angel Eyes is a movie where J Lo is a cop, and she's got a guardian angel. I liked it. Chicks in uniforms are hot.

Oh forget it! I don't think you'll be getting anything that makes sense out of me at this time of night. And I haven't even been drinking. Maybe I should have?

A few seconds ago the movie The Cell started on one of the local TV stations. Although something tells me it's cool, something else tells me I'm not really in the mood to watch a psychological thriller.

The 6.2/10 rating on imdb doesn't really help much either. I think I'll be watching parts of it whenever I go over to the livingroom. I just remembered that this is the movie with the suspension in it. I'm off to watch it anyway.

What else can I say? I left around 12h00 to take the tram to Antwerp (Central Station) and then the bus to Edegem. A total travelling time of 1h20 minutes was calculated on the site of De Lijn, but it took me just over 1 hour and 45 minutes to get where I needed to be. I think I might be able to shave off another 5 minutes or so since I now know exactly where I need to be, but still... when the course starts at 08h30, that means I gotta leave home at 6h45 at the latest, 6h30 to be sure. Damn, that's the time I sometimes go to bed instead of wake up!

Anyway, time will tell I suppose. The test itself consisted of 30 multiplechoice questions with a 2 hour timeframe to solve them. It took me just over 30 minutes actually. A good answer is 1 point, no answer equals no points and an incorrect answer results in deduction of one point. In other words : unless you're pretty sure, leave the question open and don't gamble. I didn't answer 3 questions : one concerning HEX notation, one in regard to the creator of PDP/VAX machines (DEC, I know that now, although I was almost sure I didn't guess on that one) and then one I don't even recall. I've gotta wait till September 15th to get a result and to know whether I'm invited for a personal talk.

Little Wabbit called me today as well and she had tons to tell me. Seems her life is more interesting as mine is, although it's not only fun stuff. I was very glad to hear from her and mailed her some job offers I noticed that might interest her.

Off to have a bite now and entertain the fuzzies. I wanted to watch the news at 19h00, but as Little Wabbit called I completely forgot about it. Such it life, not?

Notice : Remember the vulnerability in RPC that the Blaster worm exploited? The original patch MS03-026 has been updated/superceded just a few seconds ago by MS03-039. Either visit windowsupdate.microsoft.com to download and install the critical update or take a look at the security bulletin MS03-29.

If I ever meet that dude called Murphy - the one of Murphy's Law - I am gonna smack him upside the head so hard he'll wish he'd never have met me. In case you wonder why : it's bloody fucking pouring outside!

The one day I need to go out and try and reach a place I've never been before, it's raining as if Noah wants to take his Ark for a test ride. Thanks a lot folks, thanks a lot.

I'm gonna leave in about an hour to make sure everything goes as planned. According to the schedules I looked at, taking the tram at 13h10 should get me there around 14h17 or something like that. Since I only have to be there at 15h00, that's more than enough time, but I'm not taking any chances so I'll be off an hour early. I'll take a magazine with me and just wait if needed. I don't wanna mess this up.

I'm not gray, but women willing to receive stimulation and orgasm can contact me any time. I don't guarantee heaven, but you will have my undivided attention and I'll take my best shot (hm... that sounds a bit weird, doesn't it?)

I just called to get results on the first selection round (based on my resum�) and it seems I passed it. I get to go in tomorrow at 15h00 for technical testing.

I guess I'll better read up a bit on acronyms and general computer terms - I know most of them, but refreshing some never hurts I suppose. First things first though : gotta find out what is the easiest way to get there. Either I take my bike, or find out what public transportation can get me there, and how long it would take.

The weird dreams continue, allow me to share the one I had last night.

I'm soundly asleep and suddenly I'm sitting up in my bed, looking around. I realize all power in the apartment is gone, so I stumble out of bed, to see what has happened. I open the closet that contains the electrical box and notice that at least half of the jumpers are pulled from their sockets. I don't think much more of it, nor do I try to put them back in. I suddenly realize something strange : even though power is gone, my PC is still running in the other room.

I look for matches and candles in the closet, find them and step into the room. I manage to drop quite a few matches on the floor and finally light the candle, or at least that's what I think. It turns out I lit a piece of nylon rope and because it doesn't really give too much light and smells awfully, I realize the error. I put the rope out and get the candle lit.

I open the door leading to the terrace and when I step outside I see that some of the close and far neighbors are awake as well, lights are on in some apartments, but certainly not everywhere. I think by myself that they must be suffering from the same power outage as I am when one of the neighbors living downstairs looks up and says "hey, ServMe is here as well". When I look down to answer to her, I suddenly see something from the corner of my eye. I look to my right and what do I see? A plane landing in the small parking lot on the right side of our complex. Mind you, it's not really a parking lot, but more of a small alley in which one car can turn around with a lot of manouvering.

It's a big plane - not a B52 stratofortress, but more like a DC9 - and it should never be able to squeeze itself in the small alley. I run back inside to grab my digital cam and I snap exactly one shot of the plane when suddenly a thought hits me. All those people outside are not paying any attention to the plane that has just mysteriously landed! No, they are all looking up to the sky. I forget about the plane for a second and look up as well, and that's when I see the blue lines in the sky, right above our head. I suppose it's some kind of a UFO so I slowly raise my camera to take a shot of it, and by the time I'm ready to take the shot, the blue lines change and move to the horizon, very fast.

Suddenly I hear the voice of my sister saying "You missed them!" to which I reply - as if these are the most normal things going on in the world - "Oh, don't worry, they'll be back". And that's when the dream ends people...

Maybe not yet, but one thing is certain : Tron 2.0 rocks! I've been playing it quite a while now and enjoyed it so far. Some levels contain (rather irritating) jump sequences, and jumping is quite a pain in the ass to be honest. However, the wonderful scenery, level detail and overall gameplay will have you forget the jumping annoyances within seconds after you've cleared them. One small tip : be wise, save often.

I just got home and I'm pretty tired. As expected, I went to my dads place to help him and Hilda with some large scale garden work, and later on do some PC stuff. The new fence was finished around 19h00 (I think, I'm actually just guessing) and then we had some chinese food.

After that I started preparing the new PC - resizing disks, installing patches etc - and transferred several gigabytes of data through the LAN. I'm sure that poor UTP cable must have been smoking at some points because of the amount of data we pumped through it. Installed some programs he needed and I just got home from doing all that. During the day we laughed and joked constantly, but always while working hard as well. I like working that way.

I'm off to bed now, and I'm gonna postpone my daily 1.5 kilometers on the tredmil till sunday during the day, and do another 1.5 km in the evening. So far I've been doing that every day of the week, and while I don't feel fitter yet, it can't hurt either. Starting monday I'll slowling increase either the distance, or the speed.

I wrote down some details of the subjects we're gonna see in that Windows 2003 Server - Linux course (should I be accepted)

First we start off with some theorets and rehersal/freshening up of TCP/IP, HTTP, DNS, as well as various other protocols, and terminology. Then we move to the windows part which includes configuring Windows XP on desktops, network installation and configuration, XP 2003 Server installation, configuration and maintenance, Exchange Server, ISS configuration and installation, SQL server configuration and installation and finally ISA server installation and configuration. This is scheduled to last about 7 weeks.

The Linux part is about 2 weeks and includes installation and configuration of Red Hat and SuSe Linux distro's, creating users etc, as well as setting up a Samba (file and printing) server and Apache webserver. As you can see the Linux part is much shorter but it will be a very welcome introduction to it for me.

Courses also include getting these two systems to work together, as well as regular tests to see if everybody 'got' it. According to the professor who presented the program, 8 tests are scheduled, every time on a - aargh - monday morning.

Looking forward to it? Yes and no. If I get accepted, I'll be happy since it'll allow/force me to move on, but I'm definitely not looking forward to getting up that early to catch a bus/tram or ride my bike.

Just got back from the infosession regarding a course for Windows 2003 Server and Linux that starts early october. Some remarks :

1. the program seems very interesting and worthwhile
2. there are only 20 applicants accepted
3. there were about 65 people at the info session :(
4. first selection based on resum�
5. second selection based on technical knowledge
6. then a selection interview regarding motivation
7. when accepted, 10 weeks of 08h30 till 17h00 studying
8. possible 6 weeks of interim at a company, if possible
9. the course is not in Antwerp (easy to reach by public transport) but in Edegem :(
10. cross fingers and hope to be able to join in.

I've just updated my resum� - not according to the BOFH tips - and written a letter of motivation. In about 2 hours I'm off to VDAB to see if I can get into a 2.5 month course dealing with Windows 2003 Server and Linux. Seems pretty interesting to me, but the fact that lessons start at 08h15 doesn't :)

Those who know me are probably aware of the fact that I have a problem with mornings, especially if it concerns being awake. It seems to run in the family by the way :)

Tomorrow I'll be off to give Dad & Hilda a hand with some work in their garden that needs to be done. I'm already looking forward to it.

Well, I think the title already gives you a clue... A few days ago I woke up in the morning and I recall that I had been in a hot air balloon, but more specific details escape me, as often happens with dreams. However, the one I had this morning still is pretty clear :

This morning when I was in that wonderful state of being awake and asleep at the same time, drifting inbetween the two, I peeked through my curtains and suddenly I just knew I was in the middle of a huge area, asleep on the bare earth, winds racing besides me and the sun shining brightly. And now that I think about it, it must have been not too cozy (lotsa wind, sun, probably lots of dry sand in the air) yet it felt wonderfully peaceful.

I was at ease, felt at home. No doubt in my mind that there was water nearby, but I didn't see it in my dream, though I might have heard it in the distance. I just lay there, looked up and scouted the horizon, then put my head down again and drifted off once more.

on e-bay : an acryl painting called "Cyberweduwe" (Cyberwidow) from an artist who calls herself (himself? although the nickname leads me to believe the artist is female) "Hil". Looks nice! Comes with a poem - signed and dated - on a seperate paper.

I might bid on this piece of art, although I don't know where I'd put it yet, and I still have those Blues Brothers posters I have to (get) frame(d) as well as the Natural Borns Killers one and the Front 242 poster. Maybe I should do that first and only later buy "real" art :)

Yesterday we (my grandma, my uncle Roland, Bob, Hilda, Johan, Jess and I) organised a 'little' trip to Ostend for my grandma's 80th birthday. We only told her to keep the day available, but not what we intended to do. Around 12h00 we left at her place and walked over to the train station. It had been quite a while since she had been on a train so it was exciting.

While we were going from the local station to a major station, she kept on trying to find out where we were going. After switching trains we set rail for Ostend. Around halfway she figured out that we were en route to the Belgian coast and was pretty happy about it. It's also been a few years since she's been there.

When we arrived - about a quarter past 3 - we took the "Kusttram" to the place where we had to be, but got off a few stops early as there was still some time to be killed. Walk near the shore, had something to drink and eat and then walked on. She obviously loved it all, and the biggest suprise was yet to come! We arrived at the Media Center a few minutes past 4 and she spotted the large tents. When we walked in, pretending to just go and take a look to what was going on, she wondered if anyone could just walk in. That's when we disclosed that we had tickets and she was being treated on a performance of the wonderful Cirque du Soleil. It actually was the "last ever showing (in Belgium)" of Saltimbanco, their latest show and successor to Alegria.

At exactly 17h00 the show kicked off and sped through a world of acrobacy, dancing, singing and mime till 18h00. A 30 minute break gave us the chance to get some drinks, talk about what we had seen already and at 18h30 another hour of show, strength and flexibility was unleashed upon us. After the show we all agreed : wonderful, but you need more eyes to see (and believe) everything that happens on stage.

Walked back to the Kusttram, rode to the trainstation, had a drink during the 30 minutes we had to wait for our train to arrive and then trained back home. One more switching of trains and we got back around 23h15. Still needed to eat as well, but a good restaurant nearby still was open and served us a delicious meal.

It's been a very long (and kind of expensive) day, but worth every second of it! I'm really really glad that I decided to go along after all as I had my doubts at first.